and food and vacations, too.

Month: September 2016

Let us agree that public service is never really the agenda of any political party. It is always about power.

It was in April 2011, just after India had won the cricket world cup that the India Against Corruption movement was picking up. Anna Hazare had decided to sit on an indefinite fast for passing the Janlokpal bill, which was supposed to be one stop solution for corruption.

A colleague and I debated. I was of the opinion that indefinite fasting is taking the government as hostage. Probably worked when you were ‘ruled’ by the British, but as a fully functional democracy (at least in most parts, precisely why a lot of major decisions don’t get taken swiftly — you even need to take the opposition on board — which never wants to be on the same side, because, opposition — d-uh!) indefinite fast is blackmail and I do not agree with it.

The movement lost momentum but a ‘political party’ emerged. A new wave of hope came when Kejriwal formed first government in Delhi in 2013. Maybe, JUST MAYBE, we have an alternate from the BJP and Congress, I thought. But the moment he quit the post of CM to contest elections against Modi from Varanasi, I realised how he is, afterall, just another ambitious politician.

No, he didn’t fight the incumbent government, the UPA. He fought Modi. He didn’t choose Raebareli or Amethi, Congress stronghold, but Varanasi. Congress, which had the list of corruption related scams to its hat was not something Kejriwal thought was important to fight.

Of course, he lost. But the wound never healed. After all, if he could be Delhi CM once, why can’t he immediately be India’s PM?

That’s where his cyber warriors came into the picture. Foul mouthed, abusive kids, just out of college, who thought they are bringing about a revolution by trending hashtags. Really, really derogatory hashtags have been trended by the AAP cyber warriors. There was no dignity left.

They don’t have an agenda, except to have no regard for the post the Prime Minister holds (you like it or not, or blame the 31% who voted for him, he *IS* the Prime Minister of India, and he does represent you as long as you are part of India).

There is a new Twitter trend every day, each more derogatory than the other, sometimes endorsed by Aam Aadmi Party’s official handles and sometimes by their volunteers. Whether it was calling Modi Pakistani Pig, or Arnab as Modi’s dog, I dismissed it as juvenile behaviour.

Why am I writing this today? Well, I saw a bunch of Aam Aadmi Party volunteers in Gujarat referring to the Prime Minister as “hijra”, a eunuch.

Why? Because of ‘delay’ in giving permission to organise rally in Surat. Kejriwal wants to come to Gujarat on 15th October and since last two months Aam Aadmi Party ‘aaptivists’ are shouting themselves hoarse as how they are not given permission.

While I don’t know the status about the permission (which is to be required from Surat Police), I don’t see how is it a good idea to call the PM a “hijra”.

Is Aam Aadmi Party being discriminating towards the LGBT community? Is their idea of calling the PM a “hijra” supposed to be a derogatory term? Is this how the political party thinks about the LGBT community?

On one hand Aam Aadmi Party says they will fight for the rights of LGBT community